Grants.Gov Information

Preparing a GRANTS.GOV Application

Preparing a GRANTS.GOV Application

Download the application package and the instructions as soon as you have identified a competition you are interested in. Most agencies have used the switch to Grants.gov to update/change/expand their forms, so the new format of the proposals often comes with a considerable amount of new content or new formatting of the familiar content. Review the application package at least once early on to get a sense of the work ahead of you and to ask questions.

An application package consists of fillable forms with institutional information, budget information and short text passages; the research plan, cv’s references, letters of support and other longer text sections are then attached to the application as PDF files. The forms in the Application Packages are based on the 424/524 series of federal forms, which have been standard at USED, non-NIH agencies within the DHHS and many others, so they should be familiar to many of you. The TC budget template already has a page that formats budgets to the 524 forms. The new NIH application forms are a hybrid of the 424 and PHS 398 forms. OSP is working on revising the budget template to reflect those changes for NIH submissions.Not every field in a Grants.gov application needs to be completed. Required fields are highlighted in yellow. There is also a check proposal for errors function that will direct you to fields you may have missed or where data has been entered incorrectly.

With both older PureEdge files and the newer Adobe Acrobat forms, applicants work offline to create a single document containing all forms that is then submitted by OSP. This means that, unlike the NSF Fastlane system, a single end user has to receive all proposal components and make sure they are placed into the application forms (so it's more like a paper-based than an electronic application in this regard). Paul Kran, TC Box 151, kran@tc.edu should always be added as the institutional contact and the person to contact with matters pertaining to the proposal. Once completed, the application package should be emailed to OSP for submission.

***IMPORTANT*** ALL APPLICATIONS THROUGH GRANTS.GOV must be submitted by 5:00 pm on the due date or else they are rejected. Only OSP can submit a proposal. We cannot guarantee that any proposal received and approved for submission after 12 noon on the day before the due date will be submitted on time or without errors.